Pyramids, flowers, and salad fixin’s… yep, I have a thing for missing faces, and clearly I’m not alone! Buenos Aires based artist/designer Larissa Haily Aguado has a portfolio full of collages featuring people with various objects instead of heads. Hm, what does she do with all of the legs, you ask? Voila…

Love.

Ok, I’m writing a romantic plot line in my head as we speak! Yep, I would happily curl up with any of these paintings by Polish artist Jarek Puczel… or perhaps it would be better just to hang them on my wall. Narrative, simple, bold … oh, and those negative space pink kisses are killing me {killing me!!!… are you sensing the drama?}

{via Escape Into Life}

I have a major thing for magnolias. They are all over my neighborhood, and every spring I am overjoyed to see them bloom… speaking of joy, I am kind of in love with this work by Maine based artist Kari Herer. Pink magnolia petals helping black ink beetles take flight… yep, pure joy.

{via Honestly WTF}

I find all sorts of amazing bits & pieces in my travels around the internet. I usually post them to my “random lovely things” board on Pinterest, but today I thought I’d share a few of my favorites with you… a lovely/random way to kick off the weekend, yes? I didn’t fully realize {ok, I had a hunch}, that I seem to have a thing for neons & neutrals…

… ahhh, finished off with an amazing piece by Banksy. Ok, everything in this post makes me want to make stuff… good thing it’s the weekend! See you on Monday : )

{1. inaluxe 2. Emma Dajska 3. Jack Potter 4. Feathers {I can’t find the artist? Help!}  5. Shaun Kardinal 6. Ritsuko Ozeki 7. Chris Henley 8. Keith P. Rein 9. Leah Durant 10. Banksy}

Ya know, you think you know someone… and then they show you these?! I wrote about the paintings of American artist Mark Bradley Shoup at least three years ago. Since then, we’ve become friends, and we’re even working on a few projects together {including an art show in February 2013 in Chattanooga, GIRL CRUSH Chattanooga, and hopefully a chance for me to speak at the University while I’m there!}

Anyway, Mark is known for his muted color palettes, and mundane/beautiful Americana landscapes, which I absolutely love. We started talking about collage the other day, and he said “Oh, I do a bit of collage work – I’ll send a few over”… and this is what showed up in my inbox. Um… LOVE!!! Geesh, I wonder what else he’s hiding from me? I’ll have to raid his studio when I’m there in February!

Um, Wes Anderson, if you’re reading this {insert pipedream here}, you should have an entire wall of these ship paintings in your next film… they’d be perfect, would they not?! Vintage looking work, in truly vintage frames, but these are recent pieces by American artist Mary Maguire. She clearly has a lot of talent… but wait until you hear what she did before painting. Ready?

Mary attended Rhode Island School of Design, worked at Alfred A. Knopf Publishing and Random House, followed by three years at Conde Nast Publications working on various publications including The New Yorker, Vogue and Conde Nast Traveler… inhale… she was then the Features Editor of Lauren magazine, a lifestyle magazine with designer Ralph Lauren, and then of course onto a position with The Muppets at the Jim Henson Company as Editorial Director. And then she started painting. Exhale.

Ahh, the work of Seattle based, German-born, artist Anne Siems… so beautiful, so so strange. This is actually her work from a few years ago {here’s her more recent work}, but the closeups of these paintings on panel were just too amazing not to show. There is an entire world happening in each of these pieces… lovely lambs, tiny flowers, and a strange little man riding… um,  is that a dog?

These stunning {yet simple} abstract oil landscapes, by Toronto based artist Yangyang Pan, make me want to rake up a giant pile of neon leaves, get a running start, and jump right in! The composition, the colors, and the fact that they’re at least 4 feet wide … sigh. Where’s my rake?

{…prints available in her Etsy shop}

Happy weekend! I just wanted to pop in to say a few things about the GIRL CRUSH workshops… that you may not know:

1. You do not have to be an artist to come! I didn’t realize that a bunch of people thought that… nope, you don’t have to be an artist to attend. You just have to be someone who is creative, wants to be creative, wants to recharge those creative batteries, has occasional doubts about creativity, and wants to reach out & meet some other amazing women in your city who are feeling exactly the same way!

2. I make a pretty big deal about the cupcakes, pastries, striped straws and fancy sandwiches… all lovely Pinterest-worthy perks, of course, but not the reason for coming to GIRL CRUSH. Even the afternoon of art making {which again, is a lovely/fun/creative perk} is not the main goal of this day. Granted, I wasn’t even sure what to expect going in, but after seeing and hearing what happened in San Francisco {with Lisa Congdon}, and Seattle {with Tif Fussell}, even I’ve realized it really is so much more than cupcakes and art. The conversations we’ve had, the transparency, the willingness to open up and share doubts and insecurities is beyond moving. That’s what I had hoped it would be about – creative breakthroughs, support from like-minded people, and a new group of creative friends to share success {and fears} with… and I can’t believe it’s really happening. It’s a dream come true to be perfectly honest. I am in awe of the first two groups, and cannot wait to see who arrives in doorways of the other artists’ studios over the coming months!

3. Every penny is used to run the event {we have to pay for those cupcakes and striped straws, right!} I don’t see GIRL CRUSH as a revenue stream for myself, I see these workshops as an amazing opportunity to meet interesting, creative people all over the world… and hopefully be a catalyst to a new perspective, for all of us. I have been working on getting more corporate sponsors so that I can bring the fee down even further… stay tuned! {or if you know of anyone I should talk to, please let me know!}

Ok, I think that’s all. If you have any questions, let me know! There are still a few spaces left in the 2012 workshops:

Portland with Lisa Golightly – June 9th

Minneapolis with Jennifer Davis – June 23rd [SOLD OUT]

Austin with Alyson Fox – September 29th

Philly with Shauna Alterio – October 13th [SOLD OUT]

{Boston, Chicago, Chattanooga, Toronto, LA, Vancouver… and hopefully Hawaii… are tentatively on the schedule for 2013}

Photos above by: Melanie Biehle and Taylor Rae; Hand-lettering artwork found in Lisa Congdon’s studio by Mary Kate McDevitt

LOVE!!! A friend pointed me to the portfolio of LA based photographer Jen Gotch… and I have basically just shown you everything in her ‘personal’ section! Well, that was the first half… here’s the second half:

Sweet jiminy… I love it all! She also has some gorgeous prints for sale… oh, ok, I’ll show you a few of my favorite shots from that section of her site too!

Gah. So good! Ok, I’ll stop now.